Social Sciences Division
Doctoral Student
Graduate
Center for Southeast Asian Coastal Interactions (SEACoast)
Social Sciences 1
231
Social Sciences 1 Faculty Services
My work centers on Hmong shaman communities around the world, with a specific focus on the U.S. diaspora and Southeast Asia. In this work, I investigate landscapes and medicine as sites where shamanic logics and colonial logics interface. In doing so, I hope to illuminate points of friction between the two while also tracing places of (partial) connection.
My intellectual pursuits weave together my academic and professional background on the environment (biocultural conservation, traditional ecological knowledge, governance, and ecological restoration) with my upbringing in the Hmong shaman tradition to both further reveal and unsettle the intensifying violence of colonialism, capitalism, and secularism.
Education:
- Master of Environmental Management - Specialization in Indigenous Lifeways and Environmental Systems
- Yale University
- Bachelor of Arts in Geography w/minor in Political Science
- Gustavus Adolphus College
Environmental Anthropology, Medical Anthropology, Geography, Indigenous Peoples, Religion, Shamanism, Southeast Asia, Hmong studies
Teaching (TA) appointments:
- Spring 2025. "Introduction to Cultural Anthropology," Department of Anthropology, University of California Santa Cruz
- Spring 2024. "Primate Conservation," Department of Anthropology, Yale University
- Fall 2023. "Social/Human Sciences for Environmental Managers," Yale School of the Environment
- Spring 2021, 2020, 2019. "Introduction to World Geography," Department of Environment, Geography, and Earth Sciences, Gustavus Adolphus College
- Fall 2020. "Causes of Global Climate Change w/lab," Department of Environment, Geography, and Earth Sciences, Gustavus Adolphus College
2025. Center for Southeast Asian Coastal Interactions, Junior Scholar Research Grant, University of California Santa Cruz
2025. Center for Southeast Asia Studies at UC Berkeley, SEALIVES and Histories Grant, University of California Berkeley
2024. Eugene Cota-Robles Fellowship, University of California
2024. Asian Pacific American Religions Research Initiative (APARRI) Working Group Grant: Religion and Indigeneity in the Pacific and Asian Americas, University of California Berkeley
2023. Mobley Environmental Humanities Grant, Yale University
2023. Law, Environment, and Animals Program (LEAP) Research Fellowship, Yale Law School
2023. Yale School of Environment Summer Research Fellowship, Yale School of the Environment
2022. Fulbright Taiwan Award, U.S. Department of State (declined)
2021, 2019. Doris Duke Conservation Fellowship, University of Washington
2020. Academic Assistantship (Independent Research), Department of Environment, Geography, and Earth Sciences, Gustavus Adolphus College
2020. Gamma Theta Upsilon - International Geographical Society
2019. Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholar, U.S. Department of State
Contributing Author. The SAGE Encyclopedia on Refugee Studies (Volume Set II). Sage Publications Inc. Forthcoming, 2025